THE CHANGES IN LOUISIANA’S QUALITY OF LIFE!

Monday, March 30^th, 2026

Baton Rouge, Louisiana

 THE CHANGES IN LOUISIANA’S QUALITY OF LIFE!

 

 All we know
Left untold
Beaten by a broken dream
Nothing like what it used to be

We’ve been chasing our demons down an empty road

 

Singer Alan Walker

 

 These words hit home to me as I read a number of Louisiana newspaper headlines in recent weeks.  I’m approaching 86 years old and life is just not the same as it was when I started out in public life back in the 1970s.

 

Oh, we had some backroom gambling and horse race betting back then.  You could travel to Las Vegas for a special outing.  Today, every kind of betting is now legal here in the Bayou State.  Casino and riverboat gambling, the lottery, slot machines and video poker. Anything you want to bet on.  You can’t turn on the TV without seeing a barrage of ads featuring Louisiana’s first family of sports, the Mannings, huckstering sports betting.  Even Saints icon Drew Brees raked in the big bucks pushing a new casino referendum in Slidell.

“Sin taxes” used to be only placed on alcohol and tobacco just a few years ago here in the deepest of the deep southern states.  But they stand alone no more. Besides new forms of gambling, marijuana use is rapidly proliferating. Initially, the drug was for medical purposes and only had two growing outlets tied to state universities. Now there are proposals in the legislature to increase these budding outlets to ten or more, and legalize recreational use throughout the state.  So called “massage parlors” are growing in number, and there was a proposal in last year’s legislative session to legalize prostitution.

On the national level, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer enthusiastically supports legal pot, and will introduce federal legalization next month.  Government in Louisiana and Washington used to be all about protecting the public good.  Now it’s about maximizing revenue from whatever source is available. Government has become amoral and sin is both passe’ and just another way to tax and bring more income into state and national coffers.

Church attendance has also become passe’ in recent years, with turnout dropping from some 70% fifty years ago to less than 48% today.  Religious organizations have always had a strong presence in Louisiana, with Pentecostals and Baptists dominating in North Louisiana, while the Catholic Church held sway throughout south Louisiana.  Churches in Louisiana’s local communities have traditionally played an essential role in teaching our young people the virtue of volunteering, getting along, and the importance of family values.  Today, many churches have canceled Sunday school classes, and there is a mass shortage of preachers and priests all over Louisiana.

In my early years as a statewide official in the state, I spoke to hundreds of civic clubs where there were always large crowds in attendance.  I continue to speak to such organizations today, but there are fewer such clubs, and the membership has been dwindling.  Volunteering used to be an important part of “giving back.”  Lending a hand is not as popular as it once was.

There are of course numerous individual exceptions to those categorized in my list of a changing state we live in today.  Many of these lifestyle changes are found in states all over the nation. But Louisiana, in my humble opinion, has always been different and special.  That’s why so many tourists come from all over America to visit and experience the unique flavors of the Bayou State. 

The taste for such flavors are part of our DNA. Outsiders rarely know much about mudbugs, zydeco, Laissez les bons temps rouler!, beignets, Geaux Tigers, Tabasco sauce, Who Dat ( a verb, not a question), Lil’ Wayne, Red Stick, the Hayride, Storyville, You are my Sunshine, Voodoo Queen, King Cakes, Napoleonic Code, bayous, Satchmo and Jumbo, and a long list of matchless symbols epitomizing  a way of life that is unusual, offbeat, often exotic, and always special.

 

Several lessons can be learned here. Elections have consequences so check out the views of those public officials you vote for. Government should be there to help, not take. And if the average citizen yearns for a better quality of life for their families, they need to give back. These premises would be a good beginning.

Peace and Justice

Jim Brown

Jim Brown’s syndicated column appears each week in numerous newspapers throughout the nation and on websites worldwide. You can read all his past columns and see continuing updates at http://www.jimbrownla.com.  Readers can also review books by Jim Brown and many others he has published by going to http://www.thelisburnpress.com.

 

WE ALL NEED HEROES IN OUR LIVES!

Monday, March 23rd, 2026

Baton Rouge, Louisiana

WE ALL NEED HEROES IN OUR LIVES!

 

I’m a Tina Turner fan, but she got it wrong in her hit a few years back called “We don’t need another Hero.” The song goes on to say:

We don’t need to know the way home, ooh
All we want is life beyond Thunderdome.

 

A full life needs more than this; hope, inspiration, an understanding of the value of charity, and a following of the precepts of what is honorable.  So yes Tina. We do need more  heroes.

I found my first hero when I was eleven.  We visited, my hero and I, as a Saturday morning ritual.  I would leave my house at 8:30 am, mount my prize possession: a Red & Black Schwinn Deluxe Hornet Bicycle.  Then it was a five-block ride to the local Sears store. My mother, bless her soul, had given me a nickel to buy a bag of popcorn on the first floor of the store.  Then it was up the stairs to the TV department where all the new TV sets were on display.

 No, we didn’t have our own TV at home.  None of the kids in my neighborhood did. So when I arrived at the displays of new black and white TVs, I plopped down in a corner to watch my hero, the king of the cowboys, Roy Rogers.  He fought the bad guys in each episode, riding the western plains on his golden palomino horse Trigger.

 Author Bob Greene, a past guest on my syndicated radio show, pointed out to me that besides his weekly fight for law and order, old Roy was also full of sage advice.  In one episode titled “Uncle Steve’s Finish,” Roy warns young boys not to idolize flashy con men.  “He found out that there’s the wrong kind of hero worship, and that his father the schoolteacher was a much better man than his uncle the outlaw.” Who could disagree.

 Then in another Saturday show called “M Stands for Murder,” Roy advised how greed can ruin a person: “He didn’t want some money. He wanted all of it. You know, that’s the funny thing about greed. It sort of grows on you. It starts out when you’re young by wanting somebody’s baseball bat or football that doesn’t belong to you, then later on wanting somebody’s job. First thing you know, you’re wanting everything in sight.” 

There is sound cowboy advice in just about every episode.  In “Quick Draw,” a man bemoans that he might be a coward because he was reluctant to fire his gun.  Roy comforts him by saying: “You’re not a coward. You just won a great victory over yourself. Maybe now you’ll know what guns are really for. To protect, not to kill.”

 And in “The Scavenger,” my cowboy idol imparts the importance of generosity when he tells a skinflint: “The church needs a new steeple and the school could use a new library. Wouldn’t you rather the people remember Moses as the grand old man whose money did so much for the town?”

 Roy rode the western plains with his cowgirl wife, Dale Evans, emoting this kind of wisdom each Saturday , show after show.  I continued to watch my hero, until his series ended in 1957.  I sure miss those peaceful Saturday mornings, my black Schwinn bicycle, the nickel popcorn, and getting an education about upbeat and optimistic living from my first hero, Roy Rogers.

 It’s hard to be a real special champion today because such heroes are often denigrated by cynics, including the media. Politicians succeed by tearing others down. Investor Ray Dalio points out: “The cynics are people who haven’t accomplished much themselves and stand on the sidelines while criticizing the heroes who are on the field of battle.  Politicians are now more polarized than collaborative, more inclined to hurt each other than to be respectful, and more likely to vote along party lines than vote based on principles about what’s right and wrong.”

 Heroes are more important than ever today.  Not just to help us survive, but to encourage us to thrive and bring out our best attributes. Yes Tina, we do need more heroes.  And thanks Roy Rogers for being my inspiration over these many years.

 Peace and Justice

Jim Brown

Jim Brown’s syndicated column appears each week in numerous newspapers throughout the nation and on websites worldwide. You can read all his past columns and see continuing updates at http://www.jimbrownla.com. You can also listen to his regular podcast at www.datelinelouisiana.com.

 

 

 

 

HORSEMEAT-IT’S WHAT’S FOR DINNER!

Monday, March 16^th, 2026

Baton Rouge, Louisiana

HORSEMEAT-IT’S WHAT’S FOR DINNER!

Louisiana has been called the Culinary Mecca of America. Folks in this part of the country can take just about anything edible and make it not just good, but quite exceptional. And when we say anything, we mean everything. There is virtually no limit to what a Cajun will put in a gumbo. Well, because of federal restrictions, there is one thing-horsemeat.

For years, Congress has banned the sale of horsemeat for consumption in the U.S. But that could well change under the proposed budget by the Trump Administration.

Now I’ll admit that most of us do not regularly run down to our local supermarket to check on whether a fresh shipment of horsemeat has arrived. But I’m not all that enamored by eating nutria, a large rat, that is regularly publicized as a tasty dish by the Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries. So, to each his own.

Is there a market for U.S. horsemeat? Yes, and it’s big time in a number of countries. “Carne di Cavallo,” can be bought in most butcher shops in Italy. In Sweden, horsemeat is so popular that it outsells lamb and mutton combined. In every European country you will find horsemeat to be quite popular. In France, it’s the motherlode of food delicacies, they even have a horsemeat butcher’s organization called Federation de la Boucherie Hippophagique. It’s estimated that 700,000 tons of horsemeat are consumed annually worldwide. And for good reason.

As Gary Picariello writes in Yahoo News, “a typical filet of horsemeat is similar to that of beef. The meat is leaner, slightly sweeter in taste, with a flavor somewhat between that of beef and venison. Good horsemeat is very tender, but it can also be slightly tougher than comparable cuts of beef. Horsemeat is higher in protein and lower in fat. The most popular cuts of horsemeat come from the hindquarters: tenderloin, sirloin, filet steak, rump steak and rib. Less tender cuts are ground.”

Here’s what restaurateur Jonathan Birdsall told me about possible horsemeat demand in the U.S. “I’ll bet I could name half a dozen American chefs chomping at the bit to do things to horseback fat or loins that’d show off a delicacy few of us probably ever suspected Mr. Ed to be capable of.”  Braised on a nice bed of pasta, maybe, with a few roasted finger-length carrots.” Hmmm. Think it’s worth a try?

Like I said, we eat about anything down here in Bayou Country. I wrote a cookbook some years ago that includes such delicacies as my “world famous” squirrel stew, venison goulash, possum and chestnuts, rabbit in sour cream, and Louisiana Governor Jimmy Davis’s favorite, fried coon file’.

Seeing that our locals regularly eat alligator sauce piquante, and add to a stew or gumbo just about anything else that flies or crawls, it’s hard for many of us to get too worked up over a little horsemeat. I know that many have a special affection for the majestic horse. But all horses eventually have to be disposed of. And the same horses that would be slaughtered in the U.S. under strict guidelines are now being shipped to other countries and both treated and killed in far more cruel ways.

It’s hard to figure why Congress has such a beef with letting someone choose to eat horsemeat. Isn’t it really a freedom of choice issue? Our congressmen apparently have no problem with eating Porky Pig, Donald Duck, and Bambi. So what’s the big deal about eating Trigger and Mr. Ed?

Since we have a French background here in Louisiana, could the politicians in Washington be dangerously close to inciting another revolution by telling us what we can or cannot eat? Instead of a big fuss being made over, “let them eat cake,” the new battle cry could well be, “let them eat horse.”

Peace and Justice

Jim Brown

Jim Brown’s syndicated column appears each week in numerous newspapers throughout the nation and on websites worldwide. You can read all his past columns and see continuing updates at http://www.jimbrownusa.com. 

DELUSION OR COMMON SENSE IN THE MIDDLE EAST?

Monday, March 9^th, 2026

Baton Rouge, Louisiana

DELUSION OR COMMON SENSE IN THE MIDDLE EAST?

 

Although presidents from both political parties process no desire to carry on wars throughout the Middle East, history shows otherwise. The bigger question is just how much involvement should the United States undertake in the Middle East?  We have been fighting endless wars in Iraq, Afghanistan, and putting out never ending brushfires throughout this region for the past eighty years.  Some 20,000 American soldiers have lost their lives fitting in this region since 9/11.

It just might be a good idea for Republicans and Democrats, who fall over themselves espousing America’s continuing role in the Middle East, to take a breather and read Nobel prize author and poet Rudyard Kipling.

“Oh, East is East, and West is West, and never the twain shall meet,

Till Earth and Sky stand presently at God’s great Judgment Seat.”

 

America has commanded a major presence throughout the Middle East for one major reason. Oil. It was in our economic interest to remake the Muslim world by the B and B method. Bribing and Bombing.  President Trump just  was candid during his first term in saying: “I don’t think we should be there other than to control the oil.” In the 1980s, U.S. interests were served by pouring money and weapons into Afghanistan in support of Islamic radicals who were trying to expel the Russians. Then our one-time allies turned on us, and the initial seeds of al-Qaeda were sown, and America has been in a quagmire ever since.

In the last decade, we plunged into Iraq, where there was initially only a minor al-Qaeda presence. But the quixotic U.S. invasion poured gasoline onto the anti U.S. fire, causing the death of some 6700 American soldiers, leaving a country in shambles, with not one barrel of oil confiscated in this wasted effort. Then it was on to Afghanistan, and again, for no apparent reason.  (But al-Qaeda is lurking!)  Osama bin Laden is dead but his effort to bog down the U.S. in endless Middle East wars is right on target.

Writing in the British newspaper The Guardian, Ghaith Abdul-Ahad concluded, “The maelstrom of anti-western violence in the Arab world has more to do with decades of perceived western imperialism. Obama’s Arab honeymoon was squandered in the past by drone attacks on Pakistan and Yemen.”

 

Drone attacks he points out are used to get rid of the bad guys.  And yes, we need to get rid of the bad guys.  But as children’s book author Dr. Paul Craig Roberts points out in a Trends Journal article:

“Washington’s assaults on seven countries have blown up weddings, funerals, kids’ soccer games, farm houses, hospitals, aid workers, schools, people walking along the streets, village elders, but the Muslims don’t mind! They understand that the well-meaning Americans, who love them and are committed to their human rights, are bringing them democracy and women’s rights. The million or more dead, maimed, and displaced Muslims are a low price to be paid for liberation by Washington.”

Do you catch his sarcasm? This is the way a delusional Washington works, thinks. It’s the military slaughter of innocent Muslims and control over their societies and political life that causes the rage against us.

The Middle East has been in turmoil for over 2000 years. And just about everyone has attempted to control this part of the world over the course of history. The Egyptians, Turks, Jews, Romans, Arabs, Persians, Europeans; the list goes on none with any degree of long-term success.

From all this turmoil, there are lessons to be learned, especially for the U.S.  First, make a massive effort to become independent of Middle Eastern oil. Second, read more Kipling. In his novel, The Naulakha, he writes:

 

“And the end of the fight is a tombstone white with the name of the late deceased,

“And the epitaph drear: “˜A Fool lies here who tried to hustle the East.'”

 

 Peace and Justice

 

Jim Brown

Jim Brown’s syndicated column appears each week in numerous newspapers throughout the nation and on websites worldwide.  You can read all his past columns and see continuing updates at http://www.jimbrownla.com. 

 

 

THE LEGISLATURE AND CAESAR SALAD!

Monday, March 2^nd, 2026

Baton Rouge, Louisiana

 

THE LEGISLATURE AND CAESAR SALAD!

 

Big news!  The Louisiana Legislature will be back in session next week. We all yearn for the riveting coverage of meaningful issues touching the quality of life in the Bayou State. No, not solving the crises the state faces in healthcare, education and affordable insurance. I mean the real meaty issues where the debate goes on for days. Whether to re-instate the legalization of cockfighting? How about taking one more shot at a new State poem?

 

But if you think Louisiana has an oddball legislature that leans toward quirky solutions to non-existent problems, check out California that has moved a notch ahead of us here in the Deep South. There is great news to report. California has decriminalized the sale of Caesar salad. That’s right! It’s no longer a crime to put together a Caesar salad in California. What an important gastronomic epitome of a truly civilized state.

 

To assist in this whole “war on crime,” the California State Legislature, in its collective wisdom, created a new law that banned the sale of any food product using raw eggs as an ingredient. And what do you find in the smooth, creamy taste with a bit of a bite in the dressing that goes on the Caesar salad? Well of course, uncooked eggs. But using uncooked eggs for a Caesar salad became a crime in California. 

 

That’s right! Criminal penalties attached to this new important protection of the public health. Well you can imagine the public response. The rallying cry became,

“When you outlaw Caesar salad, only outlaws will eat Caesar salad.” And

dire predictions were rampant. Would there be a flourishing black market in contraband romaine lettuce, raw eggs, and Parmesan cheese?

 

But California is similar to Louisiana in one respect. Things don’t often change very rapidly, and naysayers thought it may take some time to bring legislators back to reality. We’ve had plenty of firsthand experience with the same foot dragging here in Louisiana. So ignoring the roadblocks, a cadre of Caesar supporters took a more gradual approach, and offered several possible solutions:

 

 Begin a slow return by implementing a five-day waiting period for Caesar salad, so the government could do a medical background check for raw-egg allergies.

 

 Legalize only “medical Caesar salad” whereby people with a vitamin deficiency

could get a doctor’s permission to buy a small amount of Caesar salad for their own personal use.

 

 Launch an anti-Caesar salad TV advertising blitz, perhaps with a commercial

showing a frying pan, and then showing the pan with a raw egg in it. The voice-over could be: “This is your brain. This is your brain on Caesar salad.”

 

Allowing only adults 21 and over the right to buy Caesar salad, on the grounds that it may be an adolescent’s gateway-salad to stronger stuff, like macaroni salad or three-bean salad.

 

We have a knock down drag out U.S Senate race that’s taking place here in the Bayou State. I can just hear all the candidates’ platforms now that could include a plank that says, “I support the Constitutional right of every Louisianan to keep and bear Caesar salad … or rather to eat and buy a Caesar salad. I’m not going to stand by in my race for U.S. Senator and allow these political eggheads to flourish and think they have the right to micromanage every aspect of our lives.”

 

Hey, this may be a pretty good approach. It can’t be any worse than some of the platforms we’ve seen candidates for congress have used in recent years. The good news is that the California Legislature did come to its senses, and you’ll be happy to know that Caesar salad is now legal in California. Let’s hope the previous trend doesn’t find its way to Louisiana.

 

If it does, you will find me in the forefront of leading the fight against the injustices of banning the salad that I eat four or five times a week. And what will my slogan be? Simple. Back off Legislature. Just lettuce alone.

 

Peace and Justice

Jim Brown

Jim Brown’s syndicated column appears each week in numerous newspapers throughout the nation and on websites worldwide. You can read all his past columns and see continuing updates at http://www.jimbrownusa.com.